A Gym Leader Covets
by The Carnivorous Muffin
Summary: Once, in a future that does not happen, Lily steps foot into Saffron City and Sabrina begins a stilted conversation. Side fic of "Wearing the Faces of Men"


**Author's Note: To those about to read this the usual two warnings. First, this is a side fic of "Wearing the Faces of Men" and if you haven't read that you'll be slightly confused. Second, this is obviously NOT CANON as we have yet to run into Sabrina.**

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It happened like this: Lily stepped into Saffron City and without thought, question, or hesitation Sabrina left her gym and invited her for tea. Sabrina's gift, more powerful than even her father's, was a strange a multifaceted thing. Even she, as a grown woman rather than a child, did not realize the full extent of it.

However, her gift, at times, could also be quite blunt with her. Visions were summarized into cold, undeniable, feelings, and though prescience was not technically in her arsenal, none the less, the future weighed down upon her.

So, when this strange fellowship of five, five where there should have only been three, stepped into her city there were certain things she knew in the same way that she once knew that she would turn her mother into little more than a living toy.

First, the boy, Ash Ketchum and his Pikachu, they almost glowed with potential. However, it was merely and would only ever be that, potential. He danced on the edge of greatness but was held back by his own rashness, his youth, his stubbornness, and his indomitable pride. He would try to defeat her, multiple times, and by his own merit he would fail.

Were they simply three, Sabrina would have taken it upon herself to teach him and his arrogant friends a lesson, or perhaps not a lesson, but enact consequences upon them. However, they were not three.

Second, the other boy, Lenin, she thought was a bit like her if weaker, reliant on some absent crutch. He was older than he should be in that body of his, cleverer by half, and where Sabrina was change and metamorphosis he was quick fire and destruction. He, alone perhaps, would see her for what she truly was and mark her accordingly. He also had something he needed from her, but time would tell if he would dare ask for her help.

Third, and most important, Lily, the second red-headed girl, was not human and never had been for all that she wore a human face and name. More, she was the reason that Sabrina would do nothing, for her powers far exceeded Sabrina's.

"Ah," the girl said, it was just the two of them, at a small café that her father used to take her to so many years ago, "So, you're the Saffron City gym leader."

"Yes," Sabrina said rather stiffly and shortly, she couldn't remember how to be anything else. Cruel, yes, cold, certainly, but never before had she met someone infinitely more powerful than her. She could no longer remember what it was like to fear anything, even her father.

"And you can teleport," Lily added as she sipped at her tea, entirely unphased, "I didn't realize people could do that here."

"It is a rare gift," Sabrina agreed, well aware that undoubtedly teleportation was well within Lily and perhaps even Lenin's capabilities.

The girl's eyes then turned on her, a terrible frightful green, one that saw through Sabrina's every thought as easily as Sabrina saw through all others. And in her thoughts, this girl Lily's, there was some great prowling beast that Sabrina dared not look at too closely. Fear, she thought to herself, was such a horrifying emotion.

Lily hesitated for a moment, sighed, brushed red hair out of her eyes and then started, "I feel like I should warn you, one of my travelling companions, I hesitate to call him a friend, is something of an idiot. He'll challenge you the first time, lose, and then somehow end up winning. I hate to tell you how to do your job, especially before you even see him in action, but never the less he'll end up getting a badge eventually. You'll likely end up handing him a badge, the others all did after all, so you might as well get it over with now. Trust me, it'll be easier on all of us."

"I know about your Ash Ketchum," Sabrina responded, her face a stone unreadable wall, watching as Lily's eyes sparked with a touch of mirth as well as relief.

"Oh, well then, that solves half the problem," her grin was such an easy thing. Sabrina's mirth, her joy, her emotions had been confined to her puppet self, she could not remember what such grins tasted like.

Normally, she was not introspective enough to try.

"I will not hand him a badge for being a fool," Sabrina cut in, and again the girl's face twisted, so human for all her inhumanity, far more human than Sabrina's.

"Trust me, that's just the way things work around here. It's just better to get it over with now and… Oh, who am I kidding?" the girl asked with an irritated sigh, "The last ones didn't believe me either."

Another dissecting glance at Sabrina, a pause, then, "So, if you aren't here to talk about Ash, then what do you want?"

What did she want? Normally Sabrina was not in the business of wanting, she had traded such emotions to her younger doll self, and while she retained vague ambitions, human impulse, it was nothing so desperate or even rational as wanting.

Perhaps she coveted, she had never had reason to be jealous before of anyone or anything, but Lily towered above her. Even here, sitting at this small café, she could feel the differences in their power and how this small girl dwarfed her and everything she had worked and sacrificed for.

Perhaps she was afraid, even as Lily had entered the city, perhaps she had looked and seen something she should not have. Perhaps, this was her desperate attempt to waylay what she saw as an inevitable catastrophe raining down upon all Sabrina had built.

Or, perhaps, Sabrina was curious, curious enough to even revive and rekindle the feeling of curiosity within the husk of her soul.

"Why did you come here?"

The girl laughed, "I followed the yellow brick road," then, leaning forward, as if to divulge a secret, she stated, "All roads lead to the Indigo League, Sabrina. I'm afraid there was simply no avoiding it."

It could not be that simple, and yet, perhaps it was. The feeling of fate lingered in the air, sitting heavily upon the seemingly oblivious girl Lily's shoulders. Not once did the girl buckle though or attempt to change herself as Sabrina once had. Sabrina, under the weight of her own powers, had split herself in two.

Such an idea would be unthinkable to Lily.

Yes, at some point, this girl who was not a girl had had the opportunity to be far more than she was now, and she had said no. For that, and that alone, Sabrina could find no words to say to this girl, this girl who was not much older than Sabrina herself had been when she hadn't been a woman and a puppet.

She knew, had she been capable of emotion, that her envy staring at this red-headed, pale, green-eyed girl would have burned down her throat and choked her.

So, Sabrina stood, dug into her pocket, and passed a single, shining, marsh badge to Lily who was from anywhere but Pallet Town.

"For defeating me," she said solemnly, "In the only battle that will ever matter."

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 **Author's Note: Written for the 300th review of "Wearing the Faces of Men" by Why881002883840002882818839 who asked for a fic featuring Sabrina and Lily having a conversation. Naturally, whenever we get around to Sabrina in the main fic, this will not happen.**

 **With that, thanks for reading, reviews are appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or Pokémon.**


End file.
